hi, my name is marisa

After a stint as the first member of staff at the Webby-winning The Pool, I have built a respected name as a feminist journalist, writing for, amongst others, the Guardian, The Times, The Telegraph, the i Paper, the Independent, Haper’s Bazaar, Grazia, Stylist, and Vogue.co.uk. I am a regular commentator on feminist issues, with appearances across TV and radio.

I started Writing About Women as a place to write freely, creatively and honestly about the lives of women - including my own. 

As a journalist, I follow briefs set by editors but I’ve always felt there’s another way of writing about the lives of women that doesn’t sit under the traditional (rigid and limiting) categories of ‘News’ or ‘Lifestyle’ or, worst of all, ‘Women’. I’m interested in the spaces in between and I’m interested in the overlap. ‘We don’t live single issue lives’, wrote Audre Lorde.

And so here I (try to) write about it all - feminism, women’s rights, women’s space/place in the world, the politics, the pain, the many types of violence, as well as the joy, magic, humour, ambition, the vulnerability of women’s lives, and now, unavoidably, motherhood. And how it all bleeds into each other, undermining, interrupting, conflicting, compounding. I try to write somewhere in the intersecting and conflicting chaos of it all.

I learned pretty early on that writing openly and with vulnerability is often perceived as an invitation that leads to an exchange. That’s why I would always love to hear from you. Say hello at writingaboutwomen@gmail.com.